MCAS: What Does It Mean for Immigrant Youth?

A panel discusses the cultural differences that pervade views on the validity of MCAS. Some students wonder why the test is so hard and why there is so little support for ESL students to pass it. Others think the testing resembles that used in their country of origin.

Felix D. Arroyo was a city councilor (at-large) in Boston, Massachusetts, United States from January 2003 - January 2008. Arroyo also served as Vice President and President of the Boston School Committee.

As Secretary of Education of Massachusetts, Paul Reville directs the Executive Office of Education. The Secretary oversees the three education agencies of the Commonwealth Department of Early Education and Care, Department of Elementary and Secondary Education and Department of Higher Education. Prior to becoming Secretary, Governor Patrick appointed Paul as the chairman of the Massachusetts State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education. He also served on Governor Patrick’s Transition Team and was chair of the Governor’s Pre-K-12 Task Force on Governance. Until his appointment as Secretary of Education, Paul was the president of the Rennie Center for Education Research & Policy. Paul was also the Director of the Education Policy and Management Program and a lecturer on educational policy and politics at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Paul is the former executive director of the Pew Forum on Standards-Based Reform, and was the founding executive director of the Massachusetts Business Alliance for Education (MBAE). From 1991-96, he served on the Massachusetts State Board of Education. From 1996 - 2002, he chaired the Massachusetts Commission on Time and Learning as well as the Massachusetts Education Reform Review Commission, the state body that provided research and oversight for the state’s implementation of education reform in the Commonwealth. In 1985, Paul was the founding executive director of the Alliance for Education, a multi-service educational improvement organization serving Worcester and Central Massachusetts. Prior to his work at the Alliance, Paul was the principal/education director and a teacher in two alternative secondary schools. He is a graduate of Colorado College and holds a Master’s degree from Stanford University.